Fears
by Lucy Hale
Summary: Bobby has to face an old fear to save Darien.


"Darien! God dammit, stop! Listen to--"

Darien didn't listen. Of course he didn't. He went plunging headlong into the water after the perp. He went over the edge of the boat and into the water.

Into the water.

Bobby pulled to a stop near the rail, unable to see through the inky blackness in the distance enough to tell where sky ended and water began.

His stomach rolled, his legs clenched. The one thing on earth he never felt, never wanted to feel, raced through him. Fear. 

Splashing below him rang out, and he cursed vehemently. Darien was in the water. With the perp. With a gun, or a knife, or whatever the fucking guy had. 

Darien needed him.

Darien was in the water.

God dammit! This was a totally irrational fear. This was nothing -- this was psychosomatic. This was something stupid left over from before he could even remember in his childhood. Dumb. Stupid. It wasn't his body that wouldn't move; it was his mind that would let it. 

A gunshot rang out. Bobby's body jerked into the motion at the sound like it was the starter pistol of some race. Darien -- his partner, his friend -- needed him, and that was more important than any strange fears.

He made it to the rail and looked down.

A minute later he was four steps back, breathing heavily and fighting the urge to spill his lunch all over the deck below his feet.

He didn't see Darien. Darien hadn't been in sight. He was in the water somewhere. With the perp. After a gunshot.

Damn it, Hobbes! Do something! Move! He could be bleeding to death down there, drowning! Anything. 

The boat rocked under his feet, and the small sound of water breaking against the side of the yacht were enough to make his stomach roll. 

He had told them. When the Boss had sat him and Darien down and told them to meet with some bad guys planning to sell some endangered animal pelts, he had been cool with it. It was nothing more than they usually did.

But then the Official told them they were meeting on a boat. The bad guy's yacht. The guy would pick them up and take them out into deep water, conducting business there. Just to be safe.

Bobby had told them he couldn't do it. Okay, so he hadn't been forthcoming with an actual reason, but his refusing the assignment should have been enough to clue them in that something was wrong. He never said no, not to anything. But he told them no. And they didn't listen. 

The Official had given him the you'll-do-this-whether-you-like-it-or-not glare that he usually reserved for Darien, and Darien had shrugged off what Bobby said and kept mentioning how easy this sounded compared to some of their other assignments. Eberts, of course, just looked silently and studiously pleased as hell that they'd found something that made Bobby Hobbes uncomfortable.

None of them had even wondered why he was protesting. Not one of them would have guessed that cocky, smug little Agent Hobbes had a secret terror left over from years and years ago, a basic, primal fear he'd never learned to get past. 

And of course the assignment had been shot to hell from the start. It was their typical set-up -- Bobby went on as the potential buyer, and Darien slipped on with him, see-through. 

They quickly spotted the first problem -- there was nowhere for Darien to hide and become visible again. The cabin was locked from the inside, and the area below-deck was guarded by one of bad guy's lackeys.

So it had only taken ten minutes of quiet, undercover panic until Darien had popped into sight, blowing the whole deal. Not that Bobby could fault him for it -- the Boss should have known better than to send a guy who could only be invisible for a half hour onto a boat that was going away from land and hiding places and counteragent. 

Now bad guy was hurt or dead, hiding out where he had locked himself in the cabin, and Darien was overboard trying to catch one of the lackeys. 

Bobby just stood there, listening desperately for another sound -- something that told him his partner was still alive and kicking down there. He stood cursing himself as a coward for not being able to get closer to that railing and look down.

And then, there it was. A sign of life. "Bob--"

That was it. Darien shouted his name, but it cut off halfway. Darien was in trouble. Drowning, bleeding, dying -- it didn't matter. Darien needed him, and he was standing there.

Instincts were telling Bobby to stay the hell where he was. Long-honed reflexes were working for once against him, trying to keep him on the deck and out of the water.

But Bobby forced his body into motion. His stomach clenched, his insides seized up with irrational fear, but he made the steps to the deck and tried to just look over again.

He couldn't do it. He backed up a step, breathing out shakily. He couldn't look down into the water. Not if he was going to be any help to anyone. 

Darien needed him. That was all that mattered right then.

Bobby took a deep breath, and it almost seized into a gasp. He shut his eyes and sent a quick prayer up to the stale, rusty God he'd never talked to much before, and vaulted over the railing.

Cold.

Ice cold. Frigid. His body seized again, but this time it was a physical reaction, not psychological. Immediately he could feel his limbs starting to shiver. 

With his eyes closed in the water, he could pretend it was a swimming pool and force his way back up to the surface. It wasn't like he couldn't swim -- of course he could. Wouldn't have made it through Quantico without being able to do a few laps in the pool.

This was probably forty degrees cooler than that pool, but he used those reflexes to stroke his way to the surface of the water.

That's where it all went bad. He reached the top, and his eyes popped open to both check his position and look for his partner.

Ocean. Water, all around. Black and impenetrable. Get out. Jesus, he had to get out. He had to--

"B-Bobby? What--" Darien cut off, sputtering out salt water. "Funny s-seeing you here," he tried again, swimming over easily.

Bobby turned himself at the voice, and stared at Darien. Darien, he could help. He could get him out. He had to get back to land. Christ, what was he--

"C-come on, Hobbes. We gotta get b-back up there." Darien was shivering badly, trying to hide his discomfort with a grin.

Bobby couldn't answer. His teeth rattled, his hands were shaking so hard as he tread the water that he almost couldn't move them. 

"B-b-bobby? You w-with me here, b-buddy?"

Above them, the deep, low sounds of the yacht's engine got louder suddenly. 

The dark wall a few feet away from them, the presence that led up to dry floors and safety, slowly pushed away, turning and angling back to the shore.

Darien gaped in surprise. "C-c-crap."

Somewhere in the back of his mind, Bobby realized that meant Riker wasn't hurt as bad as he thought. He was getting back to land. 

"Bobby? C'mon, we gotta get b-back…"

"Oh, shit." Bobby heard the whisper his voice had become, but didn't care. He was in the ocean. Trapped, in the middle of the water. Boat was gone. They were gonna die. They were gonna drown.

"B-b-bob…you okay?"

"Darien, we…shit. Oh, shit."

"W-what?" Darien laughed faintly, a stammered sound. "You can s-swim, r-right?"

A part of Bobby's brain, the part that was still functioning properly, was going at overtime. Water didn't mean just drowning. Water this cold meant shock, hypothermia. It meant death a lot more ways than one. 

They had to get help. The land was in sight, but Bobby wouldn't make it. His limbs were already staring to go numb through the shivering and cold and his own stupid, paralyzing fear. He'd never make it. 

Darien. Darien wouldn't know the dangers. 

"C'mon, Hobbes. Gotta go. 's cold."

"Darien…" His teeth were chattering almost too badly to speak. "You a good swimmer?" A large part of him was cheering at the level of calm he projected in his voice. He almost sounded normal, if a little pinched. Good way to hide the fact that his body wouldn't do anything he told it, and he felt like he was going to throw up or have a heart attack, or both.

Darien looked relieved at the question. "Yeah. Made the t-team in high school, but I got k-kicked off when I s-skipped t-too many days." 

"Okay. Here's what you do." Bobby drew in another breath, and winced at the gasping, stuttered quality. He knew the textbook warnings. He was gonna fucking die out here. Shock would….

Darien. Right. "You gotta make it to shore."

Darien's eyes went wide. "W-what about you?"

"I…I'm gonna stay here."

"B-b-bob-by…"

"You hear yourself? You h-have to move f-fast." Great. He'd caught the stutters now. "Go see-through, you won't feel the c-cold. Stay long as you can, but not long enough to go n-nuts. You can m-make it faster without me."

"W-what about y-you?" Darien asked again, round-eyed. 

"You're faster. You're…" Not scared shitless. "Look, it takes longer for hypothermia to set in if I stay still. You've got the gland, you won't f-feel the cold. Just go. Faster you get there faster you can send someone out here to pick me up."

"You sure about this?" Darien didn't look at all ready to follow his advice.

Bobby shut his eyes for a second, too briefly for Darien to notice anything was wrong. He hoped. "Yeah. Just b-be c-careful. Use it sparingly. H-how long w-will it t-take you to reach the l-land?"

Darien turned his head towards where Bobby assumed land must be. He didn't want to pay attention to his surroundings enough to be sure. "I don't know. A couple of hours."

"You think you c-can make it?" His mouth was starting to feel cottony. His teeth were chattering so hard that he was sure he was chipping off bits of enamel. 

"I think so. I've only got about fifteen minutes left of Quicksilver."

"Use it w-when you need it. G-get going, D-d-darien."

Darien treaded water beside him for a long moment. "You realize that w-when I s-see you again I'm g-gonna give you hell for being afraid of the ocean."

Bobby gave a half-grimace, half-smile in response, but didn't answer.

That seemed to alarm Darien. "Bobby?"

He looked over, wondering why the hell Darien was still there. "Would you g-get out of here?"

"I r-really hate this."

"Yeah. Go on, k-kid."

Darien shot him one last look, then heaved a huge breath and started stroking through the water, away from Bobby and towards wherever land was.

Bobby watched him go for a minute, then turned away from the sight. He was alone.

Jesus. Alone.

The feeling crashed over him like waves. It was dark, wet, cold. He was alone. He was gonna die.

His greatest fear. It had woken him up nights for as long as he could remember. Water, everywhere. Black and endless and unforgiving. Uncaring, ready to overpower him the second his arms couldn't hold him above any longer. 

The panic seized him. The images from his nightmares were suddenly replaced by memories. The feeling of the water, tossing him around lightly and effortlessly every second that went by. He opened his mouth to suck in another stuttered breath, and a splash of frigid salt water took the place of air.

That was it. He was gone, choking and coughing and fighting to stay on top of the waves. He remembered.

*He remembered being young, being in the water. Ocean. Not dark -- light. Not quiet -- filled with kids' voices and shouting and laughing. Blue sky, blue waves. White beach.

He went out too far. Sucked under by something he couldn't name. Some unseen force grabbing at his legs and pushing him below the waves.

He fought -- Jesus, he'd kicked and flailed his arms, because he wasn't old enough to know better. Every movement seemed to bury him deeper under the surface. 

His eyes opened in his panic, stinging with the salt of the water, barely able to make out the shimmering light of the surface through the clouds of blue and black of the ocean. 

His lungs burned. He had to breathe. In his surprised, flailing panic, he used up the air he had fast. But he couldn't breathe -- he was under water.

He had to take a breath. His chest was on fire, his heart racing wildly. 

He breathed. He opened his mouth and inhaled, obeying his body's demands. What went through his mouth and down into his lungs was thick and liquid and wrong, and immediately he expelled it, vomiting it back out and sucking in another breath to make up for it.

More strange, thick liquid. It sliced through him, down his throat and into his chest like fire. Burning a path in, and then back out. Another breath, more liquid. He tried to stop, but couldn't. His body was out of control, taking in more and more of the water.

No one was there, he was so far under he couldn't see the light anymore. He was dying. Dead.

He opened his mouth to scream, and the water choked him off.

It was the last thing he remembered.*

He woke up in the lab. Darien's grinning face was looking down at him. "Morning."

"Wha--" Bobby's throat sent a huge protest through him at the croak of sound, and he erupted into painful coughs for a moment before getting himself back together. "Oh, shit," he breathed out. "Wha happened?"

"You nearly got yourself killed, that's what."

"Oh. Again?"

"Yep. Lucky I ran into a boat so fast, or you might have drowned."

Bobby swallowed, fighting the strange sense of doom that word had always inspired in him. "Drowned, huh?"

Darien nodded. "The Boss had some guys on shore waiting for us, and when Riker showed up without us, they brought the boat out. Picked me right up out of the water, and we went back for you. You scared the hell out of me, pal, I gotta tell ya." 

A new voice appeared at his other side. "You were lucky, Bobby." The British accent sounded almost warm, strangely enough. "Your body underwent a severe shock. The temperature of the water can only account for some of it. I'm not quite sure yet what caused it to be as severe as it was, but when I figure it out…" The Keeper smiled faintly and shrugged. "In the meantime, take it easy, and don't make any sudden moves. You did ingest some water, and your throat and chest will undoubtedly be sore."

Bobby blinked at her wordlessly, as a gray fog in his mind began to lift, and slowly he started remembering what happened.

Darien was practically beaming at the Keeper's side. Relief his partner was all right accounted for most of it, but there was a small devil in him that turned the smile into a smirk. "So we finally found your weak spot, huh? Why didn't you tell us the great Bobby Hobbes was afraid of the water?" His ribbing had a lot of affection in it. 

But Bobby didn't hear any of it. 

He was back on that yacht, looking down at the black clouds of water below. Jumping over the railing, fearing Darien was hurt. The water, Darien swimming off, leaving him alone. Alone, no one to hear him, or pull him up when he got sucked under.

The bright sky, the laughs of children. But no one close enough to see him vanish under the waves, and no one to pull him out when he went deeper into the blackness. No one to hear the scream that was choked by water pouring down his throat and into his lungs.

"Bobby? You still with us?"

He shuddered as he came back to himself. Darien's smirk was gone now, replaced by concern.

"Sorry. What?"

"I asked how you were feeling, Bobby." The Keeper looked as concerned as Darien.

Bobby would have been touched at any other time. Now he just wanted to get the hell away from people and go somewhere to work through this shit on his own. Bobby Hobbes needed no one's sympathy or concern. "Yeah. I'm fine. I gotta take off."

"Whoa whoa whoa." The Keeper reached out and pushed him back when he tried to sit up. "Were you listening to me? Your body has been through shock. You need to stay here and rest until--"

"Forget it. This is Darien's sickroom, not mine. I need rest, tell the fat man to give me a day off. In the meantime, I can rest better alone at my place than with all you people hanging around bugging me about it." He moved around her and stood, ignoring the wheezing, weak feeling in his chest. "See you tomorrow, ace." He pushed past Darien.

Not surprisingly, once he was out in the hall and away from the lab, he heard the door opening again behind him and footsteps. "I'm not really in a mood to talk about this, Fawkes."

"Yeah? Fine, be an asshole. I just wanna make sure you get home okay."

Bobby glanced back, planting an old, familiar sardonic little smirk on his face. "You're the one who needs a keeper, kid. Not me."

Darien's steps slowed for a moment, his eyes reflecting a slight surprised anger. "Hey, I'm just trying to do you a favor here. You were almost killed last night."

"Almost. Happens a lot in this line of work. You'll learn to shake it off."

Darien caught up with him again. "Bobby, I don't want to learn to shake it off. I don't know how you can act like nothing happened. You sent me off to swim for help, and you went into shock and almost died. If that boat hadn't found me, and I had had to swim all the way back to shore, you _would_ have died. I left you there alone to…" He shook his head. 

"Darien. I don't need your guilty conscience right now. You left because I told you to, remember?"

"Hey!" Darien grabbed his arm and pulled him to a stop in the corridor. "Drop the attitude, Bobby. What's wrong with you?"

Bobby blew out a breath and looked away, glaring at the wall behind Darien.

Darien searched his face. "You really were afraid, weren't you? Jesus, I didn't mean to make fun of you…I mean…I've never seen you like that before. It just surprised me, that's all."

Bobby folded his arms over his chest and directed his eyes back up at Darien.

The younger man's expression was surprisingly understanding. "We've all got 'em, Bobby. You know that."

"Got what?"

"Fears. Me, I can't stand being locked up somewhere without windows. I guess after prison and the rubber room I'm pretty claustrophobic."

Bobby shook his head slightly, but couldn't gather up enough energy to deny it. 

"C'mon, let me drop you off at your place. We could stop somewhere and grab a burger or something."

"I'm not hungry," Bobby replied truthfully. The way his stomach was rolling around with memories and revived fears, he didn't think he'd be eating for a few days. 

"So come watch me eat. It'd help to get this off your chest."

Bobby's eyebrows shot up. "Help who?"

"I dunno. Maybe both of us."

He drew in a breath and looked into those dark, stubborn eyes. Well, shit. Darien was his friend, and his partner. If he couldn't talk to Darien, who was left? His shrink? The Keeper? Neither prospect was too appealing. 

Darien was also stubborn as hell when he wanted to be. At the very least he'd be latching himself onto Bobby until he made it home, then he'd probably want to come up and make sure he got some rest or something. And if he was really hungry, Bobby would have to be a good host and feed him,

Maybe he should just agree. It would save him a lot of trouble.

Bobby smiled slightly at his own far-fetched reasoning. Screw it, maybe he just wanted to talk to the kid. 

Darien returned the smile hesitantly. "Are we on?"

"Yeah." Bobby blew that breath out and found himself hoping Darien didn't mind hearing childhood stories. "Yeah, we're on."


End file.
